Chapter 3 Chapter two

I took the tube iron across Chrissim to Moon City, but I didn't go home. Mike asked me about a meeting that night in Stilage Hall at nine o'clock that night.Monitoring concerts, rallies, etc. is Mike's job, but this time someone manually turned off his pickup in Stilaj Hall.I think he must have felt slighted. 【① A means of transportation similar to the subway. 】 I can guess why they turned off the surveillance: it must be a political rally.Sure enough, it turned out to be a protest meeting. But what's the use of gagging Mike's mouth?I really don't understand them.I bet it's a no-brainer: Warden's eyeliner is in the crowd.Not that they'd do anything to stop the meeting, or even stop the exiles who haven't finished their sentences and keep them from talking so much—there's no need for that.

My grandpa Stone said the moon was the only prison in history that was open: no bars, no guards, no rules and regulations.There is no need to set these.Long ago, he said, people didn't understand that the long distances and expensive transportation were a life sentence for everyone.Some prisoners tried to escape.To escape, of course, you have to take a spaceship-but taking a spaceship means bribing the ship's officials, because the spaceship is almost charged by the gram. They said that some officials did take bribes, but none escaped: those who took the money didn't have to keep their promises.I've seen a body they're about to throw out of the airlock, and someone thrown into space from a ship probably isn't doing much better.

So successive wardens were not worried about protest rallies. "Let them yell and call." That's policy.The effect of meowing is no different from the meowing of a kitten in a box.By the way, there are also some wardens who will listen to the voice of the people, and others who will try their best to suppress it.The two phases cancel out, and the final result is still the same: equal to zero, empty loop. The year 2068 is the year 2068 when Morty the Sick came to power.He delivered a long speech to us, saying how the moon will change its appearance during his administration, shouting "Using our hands to cast the heaven on earth", "Shoulder to shoulder, like brothers, we will jointly push the great wheel of the times" ", "Forget the mistakes of the past, look up and face the new dawn".I was eating stew and drinking her Aussie beer at Madam Ball's restaurant called Food Bag.I remember her comment: "Speaks better than sings, doesn't it?"

She hit the mark.Several petitions were suppressed, and the Warden's bodyguards began to wield new machine guns.Other than that, nothing has changed.Before long, he was no longer on TV like he was when he first arrived. So, I went to that meeting just because Mike was curious.I kept my pressurized suit and toolbox at Guantie West Station, and I carried a microphone in my pocket.That way even if I fell asleep, Mike would get the full coverage. But I almost didn't get in. I went up from Block A on the seventh floor, and was about to enter through the side door, when a fashionable young man stopped me.He's wearing padded leggings with ruching in the front, leggings on his calves, and a bodice adorned with sequins that sparkle.I don't really care what other people wear, I wear leggings (unpadded) myself for certain social occasions, and sometimes even put some oil on my upper body.

But I never use makeup.I have too little hair, so I can't tie it up even if I want to.The young man had shaved off his hair on both sides, and the middle lock was curled up like a rooster's comb, with a red hat protruding from the front on it. Liberty Cap ① - never seen before.I was about to squeeze in, but he just stretched out his arm to stop me, leaning over his face, "Your ticket!" [① Liberty hat: a conical hat without brims, originally worn by freed slaves in ancient Rome, and used as a symbol of freedom during the French Revolution in the 18th century. 】 "Excuse me," I said, "I don't know how to ask for a ticket, where can I buy it?"

"Tickets are not for sale." "Say it again, I can't hear you clearly." "No one can get in without guarantee." He growled, "Who are you?" "I am," I replied cautiously. "Manuel García O'Kelly, I'm known to all my older friends. Who are you?" "Don't worry about this! Show me the ticket with a valid stamp, or get out of here!" I very much doubt how long he will live.Visitors to the moon often talk about how polite the people are here—the implication is that this place that was once a prison, how can it be so civilized?I have been to Earth, and I have seen the words and deeds of the people there, so I think their suspicion is justifiable.But our politeness is definitely not fake, because on the moon, violent fellows don't live long.But I don't want to explain, it's useless to tell them these words.

No matter how rude this guy is, I don't want to fight him.I was just thinking about what would happen to his face if I slapped him with number seven. Just thinking about it—and just as I was about to answer politely, I found Short Mkrone in there.Short was a tall dark man, two meters tall, who had been sent to the moon for murder.I taught him how to use a laser drill before my hands burned off.He is the gentlest and most helpful person I have ever worked with. "Short!" He heard me screaming and smiled at me. "Hi, Manny!" He came up to me, "It's great to have you, Man!"

"I don't know if I can get in yet. You see, I'm blocked." "He has no ticket," said the doorman. Short reached into his pocket, pulled out a ticket and thrust it into my hand. "There it is now. Come on, Manny." "Show me the seal on it." The doorman insisted. "That's my seal," Short said mildly. "Is it okay now, comrade?" With Short, no one could quarrel—it was impossible to connect him with murder.We went to the VIP seats at the front. "Introduce you to a very nice little girl." Short said. The "little" girl is probably only relative to Short.I'm 1.75m, not short.But she is taller than me at 1.8 meters and weighs 70 kilograms, which I only found out later.She has curly hair and rosy skin.I think she must have been exiled to the moon, because if she is a descendant of exiles, her complexion cannot be so crystal clear after several generations of breeding.A very beautiful face, with curly hair hanging down naturally, and a tall, fair, strong and slender figure, making people look pleasing to the eye.

I stood three steps away from her, looked her up and down, and whistled.She kept her original posture and nodded to me in thanks.A very brief nod.She's clearly tired of compliments and greetings. Short waited until the ceremony was over, then said softly, "This is Comrade Manny, the best of all tunnel-borers. Manny, this little girl is Wyoming Knott, and she came from Plato. Came all the way to tell us about their experiences in Singapore. She should really be thanked, shouldn’t she?” She touched my hand. "Call me 'Wyoh,' Manny—not 'Why not'!" 【① The pronunciation of "Why not" in English is almost the same as the pronunciation of her name Wyoming Knott. 】

I almost said that, but managed to control it, and said, "Okay, Wyoh." She glanced at my bald head, and continued, "So you're a miner. Short, his hat What? I thought the miners here today are organized.” She and Short wore the same Little Red Riding Hood as the doorman, which was worn by about a third of the entire venue. "It's not a miner anymore," I explained, "and that was before I lost this wing." I raised my left arm to show her where the prosthetic hand meets the flesh, (I never mind women seeing My broken arm, some people find disgusting, but sometimes it also awakens a woman's motherhood-even.) "I'm a computer technician now."

She said sharply, "So you're working for the government?" Today, with the increasing female population on the moon, the ratio of men to women is basically balanced.But even so, there's no way a senior old guy like me can get mad at women—they have so much that we don't.But today she hit me where it hurts, so I'm almost as rude as she is. "I'm not an employee of the Warden. I do business with the government. I'm an independent contractor." "That's about it." Her voice softened now, "Everyone has business dealings with the government, and it's impossible not to be in touch with the government—that's our problem, and that's what we need to change. " us, huh?how to change?I thought to myself.Everyone has to deal with the government, just like everyone has to deal with gravity.Natural law!Do you also want to change the gravitational force?I didn't want to quarrel with the lady, so I didn't say it. "Manny's going to be okay," Short said softly, "just a bad temper. I can vouch for him. Here's his hat," he said, reaching into his pocket for a Hat, ready to put on me. Wyoming Knott took the hat. "You vouch for it?" "yes." "Well, look, this is how we do it in Singapore." Wyoh stood in front of me, put the hat on my head solemnly—and kissed me hard on the mouth. She kissed without haste.Wyoh kissed with a certainty and certainty that marriage to most women would not produce.If I were Mike, all the lights would surely come on at once.I feel like a cyborg with my pleasure centers turned on. When I came back to my senses, the ceremony was over and people were whistling at us. I blinked and said, "I'm very happy about your event, but I don't know what it is yet?" "You don't know?" Wyoh asked. Short quickly cut in and said, "The conference is about to start, and he'll know soon. Sit down, Man. Wyoh, please sit down, too." We sat down, at this time, someone took a small stone mallet and "bang bang". With the help of the "bang bang" sound of the small stone mallet and the tweeter, he finally made everyone pay attention to his voice. "Shut the door! This is a secret meeting, please check your front, back, side - if you don't know him, and no one who knows vouches for him, throw him out." "Throw it out? What's the trouble! Find the nearest gate and get rid of him!" "Please be quiet! One day we will." There were fights around.In the scuffle, one person's red hat was pulled off, and then the whole person was thrown out-drawing a beautiful arc in the air, and flew out of the gate.When going out through the door, the arc is still rising.I don't know if he felt it, I think he should be unconscious.There was another woman who was asked out decently, but she was not very personable herself, and kept swearing at the person who drove her-even I was embarrassed for her. Finally, the door was closed.As the music played, the slogan was unfurled on the podium, which read: Freedom!equality!Fraternity!Everyone whistled, and some sang, loud and ugly. "Arise, you starving prisoners..." I don't see anyone starving, but their singing reminds me that I haven't eaten since two o'clock in the afternoon.Let's hope the meeting doesn't get too long.I remembered that my transponder only worked for two hours.What will they do to me if they find out that I have a sound transmission?throw me out?Get rid of me?But there's no need to worry, I built that radio myself with Number Three, and no one but the micromechanics will recognize it. Next is the speech. The content is not worth mentioning.There's a guy who's proposing to march to the Warden's mansion "shoulder to shoulder" and demand our rights.Imagine that we took the tube iron "side by side", and climbed out one by one after arriving at his private station?What do his bodyguards eat?Or instead of sitting on the iron, everyone put on pressurized suits and walked from the surface of the moon to the airtight gate leading to the surface of his mansion?With a laser drill and enough power, you can open any airtight door—but what next?Still driving the elevator for us?Or use the emergency crane to hoist everyone down, and then continue to work hard to deal with the next airtight door. I don't like working in low gravity.Wearing a pressurized suit, any accident is a big deal.If it is a disaster arranged by human beings, it will be even more serious.Perhaps the initial understanding of the moon by the first batch of prisoners who were brought here by the spacecraft was that the low-gravity environment is a good place to cultivate civility.Grumpy foremen usually don't make a few shifts, and it doesn't take long for them to die in an "accident."The big bosses have already learned how to behave, not to inquire about the truth of such accidents, otherwise they will also encounter accidents.In the earliest days, the attrition rate was as high as 70 percent-but the survivors were very good people.The Moon is not a place for the rebellious, the vulgar and the reckless.Here are the people who follow the rules. But that night, it seemed that all the reckless people on the moon were gathered in Stiagel Hall.Everyone whistled and cheered for this "shoulder to shoulder" bullshit. At the discussion stage, I finally heard some sensible words.A shy little old man stood up, with bloodshot eyes, like old drillers. "I'm an ice miner. Like you, I learned my trade while in prison. I've been out on my own for thirty years, and I'm doing pretty well—raised eight kids, and they're doing fine now. Well, none of them have been executed by the government, or have gotten into any serious trouble. I should say that I did do okay before. Now it's different, and now you have to go farther and dig deeper to find ice. "It's nothing. Anyway, at least there is ice on the moon. It's only natural for a miner to run around and explore for ice. But the government is still buying us at the price it was 30 years ago. Damn Bing, this will not work! To make matters worse, the same government vouchers can no longer buy as many things as before. I still remember that Singapore monthly vouchers and government vouchers can be exchanged at the same value, but now government vouchers can be exchanged for three yuan for one yuan Singapore monthly coupons. I don’t know what to do, I just know that cities and farms can’t do without ice.” He sat down sadly.No one whistled, but everyone seemed to want to speak. Then someone reminded me that rocks can also extract water - what news!Some rocks can extract six percent water, but the problem is that such rocks are harder to find than ice that has accumulated over ancient geological ages.Why can't these people do arithmetic? A few farmers also complained.The most typical story was told by a wheat farmer. "Everyone just heard Fred Houser talk about the ice problem. Fred, we farmers can't do much about the price. I came out at about the same time as you. I rented from the government A two-kilometer tunnel. My oldest son and I sealed it up and pressurized it. We own a small piece of ice mine, and we take out bank loans to pay for energy, lighting, seeds and pesticides, so we finally get the first year's harvest. “Then we rented longer tunnels, bought lights, and planted better seeds. Now we produce nine times more per hectare than the best open field farms on earth! But what does this bring us? Prosperity? Fred, we're much more in debt now than we were when we started going it alone! If we sold it--didn't know what a fool would buy--then I'd be broke. Why? Because I'd have to buy water from the government-- Then sell the wheat to them—the difference will not be filled anyway. Twenty years ago, I could still buy sewage from the government and sterilize it myself before using it. At that time, there was still a little profit. Now I buy sewage , but the price of distilled water is paid. What is even more annoying is that the residue in the water is counted. The price of a ton of wheat shipped back to the earth today has not increased at all compared with 20 years ago. Frey De, didn’t you say you don’t know what to do? Let me tell you: eliminate the government!” Everyone whistled for him. Not a bad idea, I admit.It's just who will come forward and be the mouse who tied the bell to the cat? Apparently, the man was Wyoming Knott. The convention chair took a step back and let Short introduce her identity. "A brave little girl came all the way from Yuecheng, Singapore, and made a special trip to introduce to you how the comrades there did it." Judging from Short's words, he hadn't been to Singapore before - which is not surprising. In 2075, the subway in Singapore’s Moon City only reached Ensville, and there were still more than 1,000 kilometers of Moon Sea① that were not open to traffic.This section of the road includes the entire Tranquility Sea and part of the Tranquility Sea, and the only way to get there is to rely on Luo Lingang Traffic Vehicles-which is expensive and dangerous.I've been there myself, but that time I signed a contract and went by postal rocket. 【① The dark area on the surface of the moon. 】 Cheap and convenient transportation is a matter of the future.Before that, the residents of Yuecheng and Xinlieng thought that Yuecheng, Singapore was all Chinese.In fact, Singapore, like here, has a very complicated composition of personnel.At first, there were people from China, and later there were Australians, New Zealanders, blacks, Marylanders, Malays, Tamils, and so on.People from all nationalities joined in one after another, as long as there are races that can be named, there are people there.Some even came from Vladivostok, Harbin, and Ulaanbaatar.Wyoh, for instance, looked like a Svensk with a British surname and a North American first name, but might actually be Russian.Few of the Lunarians know who their father is.Those who grew up in orphanages couldn't even tell who their mothers were. I thought Wyoming would be too timid to speak.Standing beside Short, she really looked like a little girl against that huge black figure like a mountain, and she seemed very nervous.She stood there, waiting for the appreciative whistles from the venue to die down.The ratio of men to women in Yuecheng was two to one, and the ratio in the venue at that time was as high as ten to one.Even if Wyoh only memorizes ABC, there will still be thunderous applause from below. Then, she started to get angry. "You! You are a wheat farmer—a farmer on the verge of bankruptcy. Do you know how much it costs an Indian housewife to buy a kilo of flour made from your wheat? How much does a ton of wheat fetch in Mumbai? Get it? It costs the government catapults to send wheat to the Indian Ocean for a fraction of the cost and it keeps going down. Did you know that? All it takes is solid fuel powered brake rockets to decelerate! And where do those rockets come from Isn't it from here? But what do you get? Isn't it those fancy goods that the government buys from other places? Just because they are foreign goods, the government can sell them at high prices. Foreign goods! Foreign goods! I never use them. In Singapore, as long as it is not locally produced, we don’t use it. You sell the ice to the government, buy it back for washing, and give it to the government for free after use, and then buy it back to flush the toilet, and return it to the government again , you have to spend a high price to buy water and the waste in it back to irrigate the fields - and finally sell them wheat at the government price - and then buy them the energy to grow wheat at the government price! Is this what you planted? Wheat right? The energy is all from the moon - the earth has never delivered even a kilowatt of energy to us. The energy of the moon comes from the ice of the moon, the steel of the moon, and the sunlight on the soil of the moon. Collect these It's us Lunarians who are the ones with the energy! Oh, you mindless things, you deserve to die of starvation!" No one whistled, and there was a dignified silence in the venue. After a long time, a voice was heard asking: "Then what do you think we should do, ma'am? Throw stones at the Warden?" Wyoh smiled. "Yes, we can throw stones. But everyone knows this method, and there is no need for me to tell everyone. The moon is a rich place. We have three million hardworking, intelligent and skilled people, and there are enough Water, everything is in abundance: inexhaustible energy, inexhaustible space. We lack only one thing: a free market. Get rid of watchdog government and we will have a free market!" "Yes—but how to get rid of it?" "Unite and boycott! This is what we do in Yuecheng, Singapore. The water sold by the government is too expensive, so we don't buy it; the price of ice bought by the government is too low, we don't sell it; they monopolize the export, we don't export it People in Mumbai need wheat, and if there is no wheat to sell, brokers will come here to buy it in person—by then, the price will be three times the current price, or even higher!" "Then what to do now? Waiting to starve?" It was the same angry voice just now.Wyoh picked him out with her eyes, and shook her head at him.This pose has been around for a long time.If a Lunar woman shakes her head at a man like this, it means, "You're too fat." Wyoh said: "My friend, in your situation, it's okay to go hungry for a few days." The audience roared with laughter. Wyoh continued: "No one is going to go hungry. Fred Houser, come to Singapore with your rig. Our water and air systems are not controlled by the government, and ice is purchased at a reasonable price. And you, your farm is on the verge of bankruptcy - if you are brave enough to admit bankruptcy, come to us in Singapore and start all over again. We have always been short of labor, and hardworking people will not go hungry with us." She looked around After a while, "I have said enough, the final decision should be made by yourselves." After she finished speaking, she walked off the podium and sat down between Short and me. She is trembling.Short patted her hand, she gave him a grateful look, and asked me softly, "How did I go?" "Very good." I reassured her, "Excellent!" She seemed to breathe a sigh of relief. But I'm not telling the truth.As far as the level of inspiration is concerned, she is indeed "terrific".But eloquence is just an empty program, meaningless.All my life I have known one truth: we are slaves - and that cannot be changed.Yes, people will not buy or sell us directly, but as long as the government monopolizes all the materials we need and controls the fruits of our labor in exchange for these materials, we are slaves, no different from slaves. But what can we do?The Warden is not our boss.If he is, perhaps we can manage to eliminate him.But the lunar government is not on the moon, it is on the earth.We don't have a spaceship, not even a tiny hydrogen bomb.There are not even pistols to be found on the moon.But if there is one, I don't know what it will be used for.Maybe we'll fight them among ourselves. We have three millions—they are eleven billion; we are unarmed and helpless—they have boats and guns and weapons.In their eyes, we are just a bunch of small troubles-but when the troubles become big, it won't be long before Dad's board falls on the children's asses. I disagree with her point of view. Isn't it written in the Bible that God is always on the side with the stronger firepower. A new round of discussions has begun.Everyone was chattering about what to do, how to organize things, and the "shoulder to shoulder" petition bullshit was brought up again.The chairman had to use his small stone gavel to keep quiet.I'm a little restless. Just then, I heard a familiar voice, so I sat down again. "Mr. Chairman, can I tell you something? Just five minutes?" I looked around and it was Professor Bernardo de la Pazza.Even if you don't recognize his voice, you can guess who he is just by the old fashioned way of speaking. The professor is a man of prestige over the moon.Silver-white hair is curly, with two dimples on his face, and a smile in his voice.I can't tell how old he was, but he was very old when I first saw him, anyway. I wasn't born when he got here.But he is not a prisoner serving a sentence, but a political exile, like the warden.But the Warden is a loser in the officialdom, and he is a reactionary engaged in subversive activities, so it is impossible to get such a fat job as the Warden.The government has abandoned him, whether he lives or dies. He could have worked in any school in Moon City, but he didn't.It is said that he helped others cook dishes at first, then worked as a nanny for a while, and later he founded a nursery school, and then gradually expanded to an orphanage.When I met him, he was running an orphanage and a boarding school.This boarding school provides various courses in elementary school, middle school and high school. There are 30 partner teachers in total, and college courses are also being added at that time. I haven't sent food there, but I have studied under him.At the age of fourteen, I got married and was recruited into the current family.I have studied for three years in total, plus some sporadic education, so my family sent me to go to school there.My oldest wife is an assertive person, and she insisted on my education. I love professors.He teaches almost everything.There are things he doesn't understand himself, but that's okay.As long as there is a need for students, he will make a price with a smile, and then search for relevant information, and teach while learning, always a few lessons ahead of the students.Occasionally, he also finds that some knowledge is too difficult to understand.But he never pretends to know.In algebra, for example, by the time I learned cubic equations, I was able to correct him in class as often as he corrected me.The difference is that he happily charges for each class. He was my first teacher of electronics, after learning from him not long after, I became his teacher in turn.So he simply waived my tuition fees, and we discussed and pondered together, and learned together.Then out of nowhere he found an engineer who wanted to earn extra money by working part-time during the day—and we jointly paid for the new teacher.He tried to keep up with me, but he was a little clumsier and a little less responsive for this kind of work.However, he is still willing to learn this knowledge and broaden his thinking. The chairman sounded the small stone gavel: "Now we welcome De La Pazza to give us a speech. Professor, you can speak freely. Please be quiet in the back, or I will knock your heads." Professors are respected.When he came forward, the field was silent. "I won't talk for long," he began, but stopped, looked Wyoh up and down, and whistled. "My dear lady," he said, "I hope you don't mind my nonsense. I'm sorry, but I do not agree with your touching declaration." Wyoh suddenly became angry, "I don't agree with you? Why? What I said is the truth!" "Calm down! Just a little bit of a disagreement. Can I go on?" "Well... let's continue." "We have to get rid of the government, you are right. The fact that all of our economic lifeblood is in the hands of an irresponsible dictator is too absurd and unbearable. It violates the most basic of human beings." The right to bargain in a free market! But I disagree with what you said just now that we should sell wheat to the earth. Please bear with me if I am wrong. In my opinion, whether it is wheat or rice, Or any other food, no matter how expensive it is, we shouldn’t be selling it to the planet. We shouldn’t be exporting any food at all.” The wheat farmer interrupted, "What about my wheat?" "Don't worry! We can send wheat to the earth, but the condition must be that they give us the same amount of material in exchange. One ton for one ton, wheat for water, nitrate, or phosphate. Equal exchange. Otherwise, then Not even the high price." Wyoh said "wait a moment" to the farmer, turned to the professor and said, "they can't accept such conditions, you know that. It's expensive to transport up against gravity, and cheap to go down." A lot. What's more, we don't need water and chemical fertilizers. What we want is not that kind of bulky goods. Instruments, medicines, crafts, machinery, etc., these are what we need. I have studied it carefully, sir, if we at a fair price on the free market—” "Excuse me, ma'am, can I go on?" "Say it, but I'll refute it." "Fred Houser just said that our ice is getting scarcer. It's true - maybe it's just bad news for us today. But maybe it's bad news for our descendants. A catastrophe. We Moon City people have been using the same water for twenty years... We also developed ice mines, just to meet the increase in water demand brought about by population growth. But now our water is passing through a After the use of the cycle three processes (i.e. wash, flush, irrigate) - as the wheat is transported to India. Although the wheat has been vacuumed, it still contains precious water. Why is the water transported to India? They already have The entire Indian Ocean! Today we do extract plant food from rocks, but it is still very scarce. Wheat is exported in large quantities, and the remaining wheat is expensive. Comrades, please believe me! For every cargo of wheat you send to the earth , your descendants are one step closer to death. The miracle of photosynthesis, together with the plants and animals on the moon, has formed a closed cycle. You have broken this cycle - the source of life is constantly flowing to the earth .What you need is not high prices. Can the money be used for food? What you need, what we all need, is to stop the loss that is happening. We must have a complete and complete embargo on food. The moon must Be economically self-sufficient!" Many people clamored to speak, and even more people talked about it, while the chairman kept knocking on the small stone gavel, trying to maintain order. In the chaos, I didn't see how they came in. I didn't start to look around until a woman screamed in the venue. All the doors are open.At the door closest to me stood three heavily armed men—in yellow uniforms, apparently the Warden's guards.At the main entrance behind, someone shouted through a loudspeaker, loud enough to overwhelm the vocals and sound system of the venue. "Okay, listen up!" the loudspeaker blared, "Stay where you are. You are under arrest. Don't move, keep quiet. Put your things down, raise your hands, and come out one by one." Short grabbed one guard and threw it at another nearby.Two fell and a third was shot.Someone screamed.A thin little girl with red hair, about eleven or twelve years old, rolled up like a ball towards another guard and hit his knee.The guard fell.Short stretched his big hand behind him, drawing Wyoming Noto to his side, protecting Wyo with his burly body, and turning to me, he called, "Take care of Wyo, Man—follow!" The door rushed, knocking the others to one side like children, and sideways. The screams grew louder.I smelled a foul stench, exactly the same as the day I lost my arm.I realized with horror that they were using lethal laser beams, not stun guns.Short had reached the door, grabbing a guard with one hand.The little red-haired girl was gone, and the guard who had been knocked down by her was trying to get up on his hands and knees.I raised my left arm toward his face and felt a jolt in my shoulder.His jaw was broken.I must have been delayed a little, because Short pushed me and yelled, "Go, Man! Get her out of here!" I put my right arm around her waist, staggered over the guard whose jaw was broken by me, and went out the door—it took a lot of trouble because she didn't cooperate and didn't want to be rescued.Once outside the door, she slowed down again and I gave her a hard push on her butt to get her to run without pushing her down.Then, I looked back. Short grabbed the other two guards by the neck, laughing and banging their heads.The heads of two people shattered like eggs.He yelled at me, "Go!" I turned and went after Wyoh.Short didn't need help, and never will—I couldn't live up to his last-ditch effort.I saw—really saw: He was standing on one foot when fighting with soldiers, and the other leg was gone below the hip.